Koza Press – The Russian Reader

Irina Slavina

Baza
Telegram
October 2, 2020

Irina Slavina, editor-in-chief of the online publication Koza Press, set herself on fire near the Interior Ministry headquarters in Nizhny Novgorod [on October 2]. Before that, she wrote [the following] post on her Facebook page: “I ask you to blame the Russian Federation for my death.”

Slavina died on the spot.

Slavina’s alleged suicide note on Facebook

Yesterday, Slavina’s home was searched as part of the Open Russia case. According to the journalist, all of her electronic devices confiscated.

“Today, at 6:00 a.m., 12 people entered my apartment using a blowtorch and a crowbar: Russian Investigative Committee officers, police, SWAT officers, [official] witnesses. My husband opened the door. I, being naked, got dressed under the supervision of a woman I didn’t know. A search was carried out. We were not allowed to call a lawyer. They were looking for pamphlets, leaflets, Open Russia accounts, perhaps an icon with the face of Mikhail Khodorkovsky. I don’t have any of these things. But they took what they found—all the flash drives, my laptop, my daughter’s laptop, the computer, phones (not only mine, but also my husband’s) a bunch of notebooks that I had scribbled on during press conferences. I was left without the means of production. I’m completely okay. But May [a dog?] suffered a lot. They didn’t let him go outside until 10:30.”

Passersby and Interior Ministry tried to extinguish Slavina. According to eyewitnesses, the flame blazed up very quickly and they were unable to save [her].

*****

This video is not for the faint of heart: it show the self-immolation of Koza Press editor-in-chief Irina Slavina in Nizhny Novgorod. From the very beginning, a bystander tried to help her, but [Slavina] pushed him away.

*****

In the spring of 2019, [Slavina], for example, was fined 20,000 rubles for an “unauthorized” protest march, and in the autumn, a record 70,000 rubles for “disrespecting the authorities.” This summer, the journalist was investigated on suspicion of “disseminating false information” because of a news item [she published] about the coronavirus, and this time she was threatened with a fine of 500,000 rubles [approx. 5,500 euros], which [Slavina] regarded as “financial murder.”

____________________________

Thanks to Alexander Chernykh for the heads-up. Photograph and video courtesy of Baza. Translated by the Russian Reader. The most recent article published on the Koza Press website was posted yesterday (October 1) at 8:27 p.m. local time. It may have some bearing on Ms. Slavina’s death.

Politically Motivated Criminal Investigation Launched Against Businessman in Nizhny Novgorod
Koza Press
October 1, 2020

The investigative directorate of the Russian Investigative Committee’s Nizhny Novgorod regional office has launched a politically motivated criminal investigation against entrepreneur Mikhail Iosilevich, who has been charged with violating Article 284.1 of the criminal code (“activity in the Russian Federation on behalf of a foreign or international non-governmental organization that has been ruled an undesirable organization in the Russian Federation”). A copy of the document confirming this fact has been made available to Koza Press.

In particular, Mr. Iosilevich is accused of the fact that, on September 2 and 3, lectures for election observers from the Yabloko Party were held in his premises (That Very Place, on Gorky Street), lectures that were twice disrupted by the police. According to investigators, activists from the Open Russia movement organized the lectures. Previously, That Very Place was a venue for discussions of current political problems in Russia, for which Mr. Iosilevich was twice charged with and convicted of administrative offenses.

As part of the criminal case against Mr. Iosilevich, the homes of several Nizhny Novgorod residents—Alexei Sadomovsky, deputy chair of the Yabloko Party’s Nizhny Novgorod regional branch; Dmitry Silivonchik, former coordinator of Alexei Navalny’s headquarters in Nizhny Novgorod; Roman Tregubov, current coordinator of Alexey Navalny’s Nizhny Novgorod headquarters; civic activists Yuri Shaiposhnikov and Mikhail Borodin; and Koza Press founder and editor-in-chief Irina Murakhtayeva (Slavina)—have been searched by law enforcement officers, who, among other things, confiscated electronic devices, personal belongings, documents, and notebooks containing notes.

Translated by the Russian Reader

imgbin-islamic-state-of-iraq-and-the-levant-black-standard-boko-haram-syria-others-XD0ZwSqRYuFuazPa6K3kJy23r The Islamic State’s Black Standard was used by Russian state prosecutors as evidence that three Uzbek nationals resident in the Nizhny Novgorod area were involved with the terrorist organization. In fact, the flag that was entered into evidence in the case probably belonged to an FSB provocateur. Image courtesy of IMGBIN

Video Published Showing Nizhny Novgorod FSB Provocateur Recruiting for ISIL
Irina Slavina
Koza Press
August 25, 2019

On August 22, the Russian Supreme Court’s Judicial Board on Military Cases considered an appeal of the sentences handed down to three Uzbek nationals whom the FSB’s Nizhny Novgorod Regional Office had accused of involvement in ISIL, a terrorist organization banned in Russia. The charges against Azamatjon Urinov (b. 1988), Adishun Husanov (b. 1990), and Dilshodbek Yuldoshov (b. 1996) were based on the testimony of another Uzbek, identified as “Ulugbek,” as well as videos shot with a hidden camera in an apartment, allegedly rented by “Ulugbek” in the Bor Urban District. The videos are posted below.

When it heard the case in February of this year, the Moscow Military District Court, chaired by Judge Albert Trishkin, refused to examine the videos during its hearings. Nevertheless, State Prosecutor Vsevolod Korolyov asked the court to sentence each of the defendants to sixteen years in maximum-security penal colonies for the actions captured in the videos.

urinova Defendant Azamatjon Urinov’s wife fainted when she heard the prosecutor ask the court to sentence her husband to sixteen years in prison. Photo courtesy of Koza Press

The court demonstrated how much the evidence gathered by state investigators and the arguments made by the persecution weighed by adding Russian Criminal Code Article 30.1 (“preparations for the commission of a crime”) to the charges against the three defendants. This enabled the court to sentence them to shorter terms in prison than were stipulated by Criminal Code Article 205.5.2 (“involvement in the work of a terrorist organization”). Consequently, Husanov was sentenced to seven years in a maximum-security penal colony, while the other two defendants were sentenced to six years each.

It took the court four days to try the case.

In the video below, shot by a hidden camera in the afternoon, “Ulugbek” puts on a black [New York Yankees] cap at the 7:35 mark, gets up out of bed, goes to the closet, and takes a piece of black fabric emblazoned with Arabic script and the ISIL logo [the so-called Black Standard of the Islamic State], which he then hangs on the wall. This flag would later be entered into the physical evidence in the case against Urinov, Husanov, and Yuldoshov. “Ulugbek” would then persuade his countrymen to swear an oath of allegiance to an Islamic state emir. He then, allegedly, went to confess to law enforcement authorities, who classified his identity, exempted him from criminal charges, and sent him back to Uzbekistan.

He did not attend the trial, even as a witness.

In the second video, recorded in the evening, it is “Ulugbek” who talks about the war in Syria and his plans to travel there to help his fellow Muslims. This was established by Husan’s defense counsel, Shuhrat Hamrakulov, who speaks Uzbek.

“Ulugbek” thus entrapped Urinov, Husanov, and Yuldoshov into committing a crime while avoiding criminal prosecution himself; no charges were filed against him. Accordingly, there is good reason to believe he was a provocateur working for the FSB’s Nizhny Novogorod Regional Office.

The Russian Supreme Court’s Judicial Board on Military Cases rejected the appeal of the sentences handed down to Urinov, Husanov, and Yuldoshov, but it reduced their sentences by six months each, their defense lawyers told Koza Press. Their sentences have thus come into force.

Russian Deputy Prosecutor General Sergei Zaitsev gave Nizhny Novgorod prosecutors a dressing-down for the fact that they had not uncovered a single piece of evidence concerning the financing of terrorism in their region.

Thanks to Two Hundred Fives for the heads-up. In her comment to their reposting of this article, Petersburg Public Monitoring Commission member Yana Teplitskaya noted that all three defendants in the Nizhny Novgorod “Islamic State” case were, allegedly, tortured in custody. Translated by the Russian Reader